Sunday, December 28, 2008

Ginormously Delicious Chocolate Chip Cookies

Hope everyone enjoyed the holidays! Though I had every intention of keeping up with the blog and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas, I came home to find my parents' internet connection moving at the speed of well, dial-up. Even with DSL, something was clearly off and internet surfing took a backburner to make time for eating. Seriously, I realize everyone talks about holiday eating, but with our two families in the same city, we took holiday eating to a new level. Two-dinner-a-day habits are hard to break. My stomach feels empty if an hour has gone by without a feeding.

As you can imagine, it feels good to be back home and getting back to a more normal eating schedule. I've increased the veggies in my diet, tried to return to running and limited myself to three meals a day (down from 5-6!) Even with my new healthy outlook, I certainly still make room for ginormous chocolate chip cookies.

After indulging in days of Momma's Asian delights, I had a hankering for good ol' chocolate chip cookies. I spent a few minutes drooling over Tastespotting's cookie gallery and settled on the cookies made by Easy Peasy. Her cookies looked huge, soft and well, perfect. I used mini chocolate chips (my new obsession) and about 1/4 cup of white chocolate chips to shake things up. Michelle measured out about 1/2 cup dough for each cookie. Wanting to have cookies to take to work (and prevent us from eating them all) I used a 1/4 cup of dough for each. My cookies were still huge!

I. Love. These. Cookies. These were so fabulous and sinful. If you're not feeling overindulged yet, I suggest you get yourself into the kitchen and make these. Dieting should be addressed after the New Year! :)

Enjoy the rest of the holidays!! It'll be sad when we get back to full work weeks, huh? :)

Directions1. Heat oven to 325 degrees. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.2. Whisk dry ingredients together; set aside.3. With electric mixer, beat butter & sugars until thoroughly combined.4. Beat in egg, yolk and vanilla until just combined.5. Add dry ingredients; beat at low speed until combined. Stir in chips.6. Measure 1/4 cup of dough and roll into ball. Holding dough ball in fingertips of both hands, pull into 2 equal halves. Place dough halves together, ragged side up. Place formed dough onto cookie sheet with about 2 inches in between (the cookies will spread).7. Bake, reversing position of cookie sheets halfway through baking, until cookies are light golden brown and outer edges start to harden yet centers are still soft and puffy.8. Cool cookies on sheets until able to lift without breaking and place on wire rack to cool.